Lately I have been a victim of hummingbird mind. I have many ideas for paintings in my head, and I flit from one to another like a hummingbird. I've had three commissions in the last couple of months. All were from small, bad photos. Portraits of people I have never met. Those are really so hard. I did an okay job on them. The likesness was good. I don't think the likeness can ever be great when you haven't spent any time with the person. I get a feel for who they are through the photo, but its pretty weak. The whole process was work, and not all that enjoyable. I was thrilled to get it. And thrilled that I'm finally making some money. But it seems to have undermined my creativity. I've started a couple a new paintings, but I can't seem to get a clear vision of where I'm going. And it's not good enough anymore to just copy what's in the photo. I want to put more of myself into it. But I'm not sure my skills are up to it yet. I started a landscape, a canoe backlit by morning light on a lake. The photo is all greys, very little color. But in my vision of it I see a beautiful sunrise reflecting in the lake. The composition is very nice, the values strong, so it seemed a perfect candidate to experiment with color from my own vision. I see other paintings that I love. They are usually done in clear pure colors, realistic but simplified. No mud. I work in watercolors these days so mud is an issue. When I look at a subject there is always a lot of grey and brown. And yet I see paintings where these colors have been translated into beautiful pure color. As I'm trying with this landscape though the colors just aren't working. There are too many, or they don't harmonize. And my darks always get a matte dull look to them. Well. I need to get back to the studio and keep trying.

Living with Art

First post here. I'd like to maintain this blog to explore my feelings and experiences on my journey with art. I discovered art very late in life - about 45. I am so very glad I did, but I also regret all those lost years. I know I won't have enough time to really develop my vision, but it doesn't matter. If I hadn't discovered it I would be still trying to find the outlet I searched for all my life.

I've always felt I was an artist, but having grown up in public schools, I learned early on that a person either has IT or doesn't. And I didn't. According to teachers and parents. Strangely enough my mother always wanted to be an artist. She used to tell me she had named me Karen so that my initials would be KAN and showed me how to draw a little can to sign my art with! It seems so strange to me that she didn't encourage me. And yet I think it was that she wanted to be an artist, and never developed it. So she couldn't see her way to it for herself or me. She used to buy us paint by numbers and we spent many a happy hour doing them together.

Why did I feel I was an artist? I have a great deal of patience, and ability to focus for hours on end on a project. In my pre-art life it was knitting, crocheting, sewing, embroidery. I seem to see the world differently than most people I know. I've always been "smart" and was on that track in school, but never really fit in with the other kids. I've always been too passionate. I can be totally enthralled by something I see. I seem to be an odd combination of very visual, sensual and passionate. At the same time, especially for a woman, I am very left brained and analytical.

And color. It is really color that I long to express. I've always been enthralled by color. Its' such a strange experience I find it very difficult to describe.

It's very interesting to me that as I try to explore this experience of creating art, words fail me. For a long time I thought I was going to be a writer. And yet art takes me to another place in my mind. It lets me express things that words can't. The process of translating the experience into words limits it. My technical abilities in art are still limiting me. But I can sense that the potential is there. A single image can't be totally pinned down. It ignites the visual mind and creates bridges and pathways to experiences, images, thoughts that may have been lost for years. Or that lay just beyond, in the fog out there somewhere.

So, as I blog along, I hope to discover some insight along the way. Signposts hidden in my mind.